The continent of Atheus lacks deserts, and since glass is made with sand, glass is a luxury material. Though glass has been found, its base materials are in insufficient quantity to allow much technological innovation into mass production. Colored glass is by far the most common, and is still quite expensive.

Glass is such a luxury that it can cost more than a similar colored gem. A ring with a bead of transparent white glass costs far more than a diamond. In fact, some frauds try and sell diamond rings as glass rings.

That, too, is another point. Diamonds are dirt cheap. They are quite common, as it is in the real world. The difference between Atheus and the real world is that diamond companies haven't bought up all the diamonds.

Common gems will be cost less than glass, and rare gems will be equal with glass.

Who makes glass? Selthia. Selthia is the biggest producer, with the other human countries having some production. Selthia can make it so fast as it is placed next to the river and the ocean, giving it lots of sand from the beaches to produce sand with. The river brings sediments from the mountains and from the plains to Selthia. Dethia, though it has an equally advantageous river-and-ocean side location, has the Southern Hills blocking sediments from coming to its side of the river.

The Savage Races (because that's what the humans call them, and its a useful term) don't make glass because they need to live a more down-to-earth lifestyle. They are worried more about food production than luxuries, and they prefer using clay for pots, because of its ease of use and accessibility.

Naturally, most countries have forests that are logged within their own borders, but such forests are small, and some have been turned into park lands, for the local rulers to hunt in private on. Also, the forests that are open to logging usually have some conservation guidelines on them, to keep the forest the same size and the same amount of biodiversity. Thus, the major source of logging comes from the west.

The western forests cover a little less than half the continent, and are thus a great source of wood for all the purposes of civilization. This is especially true of the northern forests, because there you see the development of Ponderosa Pine and Douglas Fir ecosystems. Those pines are great sources of timber. And another benefit to the north is the two rivers, which allow for floating the logs downstream to the transport ships- since no one wants to carry a giant tree hundreds of miles of hostile natives. The final benefit is the fact that logging in the north has been made illegal by all of the countries (though for some its more because Obstaria and Tauria want them to), and most countries will turn a blind eye if you aren't too obvious about what your doing. Making the trek to verify the logging camp is much too far.

The main problem with the logging operations in the west is the Barbarians. The tribes near where a logging group is setting up camp typically don't like these logging operations, and are fully capable of slaughtering the workers. And so the logging companies have several options available to them: Defense, Trade, Offense, and Espionage.

Defense is the simplest. You get some mercenary group to defend your loggers (Plot Hook: the logging company wants the PCs to protect this and this camp). This has its risks, because occasionally the nearby tribes will gang up on the camp, and attack in numbers that the mercenaries can't defend against. In Trade, you buy off the natives. This could involve buying one to protect your logging camp, or simply paying all the nearby tribes to not attack. Offense is where you clear out the natives from the area. (Plot Hook: If you can't guess what should go here, then get out of the GMing business. Suffice it to say heavily armed PCs, and a target). Some companies, because enough mercenaries to do this is way too expensive, will manipulate the government into doing it for them ("Hey, I recently gained info that those Raiders that were pillaging your coast comes from this place. How about a quick, surgical strike? I'll even hire a couple mercenary corps to aid you."). In the final option, Espionage, you get the nearby tribes to attack each other, and in the ensuing war you quietly and unobtrusively chop some trees down (Plot Hook: We want a war between these two tribes, you PCs. Go make it happen).

Naturally, most companies use a mixture of these methods, or invent new methods of their own.

Because of the inherent danger for the loggers in logging in the west, they usually get better pay, better benefits, and better pension.

Atheus has slavery. However, it isn't humans enslaving humans, because humans are "too good" to be slaves. No, its the Barbarians, the Savage Races, that are enslaved.

What happens is that slave ships sail the west, kidnap some slaves, and drag them back east. They are then bought, and put to work.

This entire operation is illegal. Tauria and Obstaria hate the idea of Barbarians being east of their border, even if its only to be put in slavery. They feel that the chance that slaves could escape and form Barbarian communities a risk that they are not willing to take. And so the world follows in their footsteps. When has it hurt to go with the two most powerful countries in the world?

But slavery does exist. But its has to stay hidden, and nondescript. Which is relatively easy. Since the slaves themselves are Barbarians, no one cares much. So you can have some slaves working a plantation with the neighbors shrugging their shoulders and going back to their own work (or, perhaps, doing a little blackmail).

There are two main restrictions on slavery. The first is Tauria and Obstaria. Slavers have to evade naval patrols to bring the goods in, or otherwise get killed, along with the slaves. The other is the cost- it is expensive to transport a slave all the way from the west all the way to the east, while evading the governments that do actually care enough to try and block the slavers.

Even though technically its speciesism, I'm going to refer to it as racism. That is, the racism if the humans towards the Barbarians, Savage Races, etc.

Tauria and Obstaria are the most racist countries, mostly because of the heavy raiding going on at their western border. Each raid perpetrated by tribes that need food and are still suffering from the after effects of the Territory Wars results in dead humans and burning farmlands. Though this was the humans fault, since they had driven the Savage Races out, they still blame those Savage Races.

The racism of Tauria and Obstaria is also caused by the two governments. The two western countries want to keep a hold onto their spot as the two top countries in the entire world- a position gained because of the violence of the World War. The easiest way to do this is with a strong military. And the way to get people volunteering for the military, or at least willing to go to war if they get drafted? Sell it as fighting the Savage Races. They are all ready racist against the Barbarians, so encouraging that racism results in more and more people signing up for the soldier's life.

The rest of the world, however, is more apathetic to the Savage Races. Oh, the elves and dwarves and goblins and orcs are, of course, still inferior to them, but they are less and less racist the farther east you go. In fact, some eastern communities (though only in small communities, such as villages) have started trade relations with Barbarian tribes that live in secret within the human lands. Those communities are usually willing to keep the tribe secret.

This rule of lesser racism the father east bears exceptions. Some communities are extraordinarily racist, others are not. It all depends on where you go.

There are three main groups that use the sea in Atheus. Raiders, merchants, fishermen, and the navy. We will examined each in turn.

First, the merchants (Side Note: there are no passenger ships. Travelers who want to go by sea rent some extra space aboard a merchant ship, and provide their own food and shelter). Depending on where you need to go, travel by sea may be faster or cheaper than travel by land. Especially if you'd need to cross several borders- importation of foreign goods is taxed. Therefore, the merchants may flock to the sea. But because of the shape of the continent, there are no major islands for them to go to. Therefore, there is simply no point in putting in the time and money to discover the technology to allow ships to sail deep in the ocean. So, merchant shipping hugs the land.

This in turn effects both the fishing ships and the navy. We will examine the fishing industry before the navy. Because the people with money (the merchants) aren't spending that money on deep sea sailing, fishing ships also hug the shore. And besides, the coastline of Atheus does not facilitate fishing. The most common area with fish are the northwestern islands. Naturally, only the barbarian tribes of that area can access that resource. Thus, the small number of fisherman are confined to the coastline, and cannot go into deep water and get whales, porpoises, etc.

The navies of the humans, too, are affected by the merchant's failure to invent devices for deep sea exploration. Though the human countries could pour money into that research, there are far more pressing matters for them. The navies tend to be pathetic, especially compared to the various navies of Earth. The ships use old tech, face budget issues (most military spending goes into the army), and lack of recruits. Because of the shape of the continent, naval battles have almost never featured into any wars. Except for one ancient one (that predates the banishment of the non-human races), where one tiny city-state built a fleet in secret and used it to conquer another city, the only naval battles are between the navy (though almost always on the northern section of the human portion of Atheus) and the Raiders.

It is the Raiders who actually use naval technology. Based in the northwestern islands and on the coast near there, they Raiders evolved from fishermen. As the story goes, Gertyl the Red, a dwarf of a tribe that was highly dependent on fishing, was captain of a small fishing ship (Athean dwarves are ambivalent towards water, as are every other race). One year, there wasn't much fish to catch, and so Gertyl stuck on the grand idea of sailing his ship down south and taking the humans. He was very successful, and so the Raiding was born.

Raiders depend on quick, surgical strikes on area that have the maximum amount of resources and the minimum amount of protection. There ships reflect this, and the Raiders have, through their own research, made ships that can quickly disembark onto shoreline (though this is unimportant, as you can just anchor a mile or two away from the attack spot), and can quick embark onto the open sea, preferably before the cavalry come. Though the Raiders themselves have not yet found methods of deep sea travel, they bear the greatest chance of discovering it. Some tribes are trying to improve their Raiding speed, while others may try to escape outside the navy's reach and into deep waters- thus giving them an unmolested trip home.

On a more personal note, yes, I'm going to have to pick one of the following religions to turn into a full fledged sub. And two, since I plan to pledge to the Divine Synod, I'll expand another of these religions there. I plan to stick around with Atheus for a while.

Okay then. Onward to religion. First, we are going to discuss the Barbarian religions. The Barbarians are typically polytheistic. Each tribe worships a particular god, who has a pair of things the god is the lord of. For example, a tribe of goblins may worship Elthiyanos, God of Storms and Spears. That tribe would have monuments towards Elthiyanos, and so on and so forth. Typically, a tribe's god reflects the tribe's culture in some way. The goblins worshiping Elthiyanos may prefer using spears in combat, or will use their racial abilities to make magic weapons that use storm-like magic as an ability. Multiple tribes can and will worship the same god, and some gods of different tribes can be god of the same thing. With the Elthiyanos example, say that a tribe of orcs lives nearby, and worships Grathka, God of Storms and Fear.

This hodgepodge of religions and different god worshipping does not lead to animosity, except in the second example, of two tribes worshipping gods that are god of the same thing. The goblins worshiping Elthiyanos and the orcs worshiping Grathka are probably going to get into a Holy War between the two sides, and will only end when one side converts to the other (or the two gods are merged into one god, that is lord of Storms, Spears, and Fear, but the Kill-Them-Until-They-Agree-With-Us is far, far more common).

The humans, on the other hand, have two main religions. The first is Trianarianism. This is the one I'll probably expand into a sub (NOTE: I just expanded this one. Link: Trianarianism.) The basic tenets is that there are three main deities/ways of life. These three are Ambition, Altruism, and Honor. You pick a Way when you become 18 years of age. Switching Ways is allowed, but highly frowned upon, and may lead to being exiled or shamed out of whatever town or city you were living in.

The second religion of the humans is called Lunae. It is the middle ground betwen the human's Trinarianism and the barbarian's polytheism. It features a total of eight gods, each representing a phase of the moon and a characteristic of that phase. The eight would be new moon, waxing crescent, waxing half moon, waxing gibbous, full moon, waning gibbous, waning half moon, and waning crescent. The moon a person is born under is believed to determine the type of person you are.

These three religions don't stay on their side of the border. You can see Trinarianistic barbarians, and polytheistic humans. However, Lunae is more common to be worshiped by all the races than the others.

A brief mention of cults should be put here. Cults, in both Atheus and real life, are not necessarily evil. They are simply new religious movements that are probably weird to the main religion in some way. For example, Christianity was a cult back when it first began. In Atheus, cults have and do start. They usually start in small, human villages- the barbarians are busy trying to survive to try and make up a new religion. Some of them are, yes, "evil," and do the whole Human and Animal Sacrifice to strange heathen demons with far too many tentacles (there needs to be someone for the PCs to kill), and some just think that everyone should get along and be nice to each other for a change.

I should probably do a post on magic in Atheus. I bring that up because this post touches on one aspect of magic: Necromancy.

Though various false twists of logic that only society can, much of Atheus has decided that scaring the undead with Jack o' Lanterns and other such wards keeps those undead away. And from that logic, Soul Scaring Day was born. The holiday is one that's for the children, and in it, the parents let their kids craft away. They'll let the kids carve Jack o' Lanterns, and some wooden wards, and hang the old horseshoe on the door, and all of that stuff.

And what with all this pumpkin carving, there's usually a pumpkin pie contest for the adults to compete in and the kids to sample (and to help their parents with the competition through sabotage by stealing the neighbor's pie- Oh! Instant Plot: Where the H*** is my Pie?!? Turns outs ghosts took it).

And then, during the evening, with the house made safe from undead intrusions, its safe for the father to tell ghost stories to his kids.

Some of what I'm about to write will invalidate what I have written in my Atheus sub. My response as to why I'm about to invalidate it is this: that was more of a placeholder until I could create a reason for magic that was more in tune with my ideas for the setting. I'll go back and put and edit in there eventually.

Magic exists in a whole other dimension from the one in which Atheus lies, and yet is an integral part. I lack the vocabulary to adequately describe what is actually occurring. Magic flows through the very being and souls of the denizens of Atheus as a river. And where does it come from? It comes from the wizards. Select few living organisms (these organism including plants, animals, bateria, protists, and fungi in equal numbers) can act as a conduit, a spring (to continue the aquatic analogy from before) for that magic into the real world. And from those wizards, the magic flows into others.

As I described in my How Weapons Become Magic Weapons sub, which I made a part of the Atheus universe, a warrior's weapon can gain magic simply by doing great deeds. The mechanics of this act can be explained thus: using the aquatic analogy, the great deeds done by the warrior, and the extended use of that weapon create a depression in the land on which the magic/water flows. Water falls into it, and fills it, and thus is absorbed by the weapon and is able to give off magical powers. You could also think of it as the magic being attracted to the weapon through magnetism.

I also mentioned goblins being the only race that could craft magic weapons and magic tools without those weapons and tools being used. How is this done? The goblins have the inherent ability to somehow sense it, and have the magical equivalent of buckets to carry the water and dump it where it will. They have developed a process to enhance their natural ability to force the magic into the weapon. And thus the weapon gains magic.

Wizards themselves, as I said before, can be of any species. You are just as likely to have a human wizard as you are to have a rose wizard. "But what does it matter if a rose is a wizard?" a reader might ask. "It has no brain, it cannot cast spells." There are two types of magic used by wizards: sorceries and spells. Sorceries are wild magics, unbridled magics, the magics of someone or something that does not know how to control or contain the magic. Usually, the sorceries will aid the wizard in some way. And not necessarily anyone else. For the rose wizard, its sorceries might increase its growth rate drastically, so it absorbs much more sun, the better to photosynthesize with. For a wolf wizard, its sorceries might make its prey slower and more lethargic. And so on. Animal, plant, fungi, protist, and bacteria wizards can be very deadly. Thankfully, wizards of all species are exceedingly rare.

The second type of magic is spell magic. Humans, dwarves, and elves have long ago (back before the humans started being racist toward the other races and kicked them out of the eastern half of Atheus) invented spells. They are a structured magic, an organized magic. They have specific effects and draw backs, and are governed. It allows a wizard to know exactly what will happen when they release the magic. The main drawback of spells (with the drawback of sorcery being the randomness) is how exhausting it all is. Controlling the magic as it comes out burns energy. Holding it all in so only a controlled trickle can come forth burns your body's stores of energy.

Both types of magic never have much of a lasting effect. Though this is misleading. The effects of the magic will stay forever, but the magic itself disappears. Casting a fireball will cause burning and death. The burning and the death lasts forever (the scars won't disappear, the ashes won't revert into wood, and the bodies won't resurrect), but the fire will disappear. The more magic (and thus the more energy) used, the longer the effects of the spell can last, but there will be an end.

Next up: Spells and their Sub-classes! Including everyone's favorite, Necromancy!

I really like the idea that anything with a soul can be a wizard. Rose wizard = double plus good. You could event take another step in the Shinto direction, and say that everything has a soul and can therefore be a wizard. Rock wizards and waterfall wizards.

Anyways, I'll put your comment to bed before I continue with the next Atheus post.

This idea of rock wizards intrigues me. Especially the idea of a random, violent burst of magic when you step on that rock. But the mechanics of it doesn't really fit into the idea of magic that I have for Atheus. How would the magic get into it, first of all. Of course, if you wanted a magic waterfall, simply add bacteria wizards that live in the area.

And your last comment, about not liking the word sourcery, what about it do you not like? The phonetics of the word? The way I use it in Atheus? Because if you have a valid reason why I shouldn't use sourcery as the wild, uncontrolled magic, then I'll gladly change it.

Not to hijack your sub caeser... but I want to weigh in a comment. The glass/gem concept is great. I never really thought about the idea of how readily available glass is to some cultures. Coastlines still have beaches, and while not all are sand filled (Had beaches back home with smooth pebbles instead of sand. The cool thing about the beach was it was a major facing beach so all of the items dropped in the ocean within a certain distance - totally unknown by the way Im not an oceanographer - got washed up on the shore. So anything glass that fell into the ocean ended up on the beach. All of it ended up broken and the constant washing up under the waves by the stones broken them down into small tiny pieces of smooth glass stones. The beach was nick named jewel beach because of the constant little glass stones (gems) you could find. Smooth like river stones some clear some naturally frosted by being pitted by rubbing larger rocks.

Hurrah! Two people have responded! And its good to know that I've given someone something to think about, even if its for glass. So thank you, for taking the time to share that I've expanded your knowledge (or refreshed your memory) on some subject.

Since they were invented by man,* spells have been given categories to be placed into. There are five main types: Domestimancy, Telemancy, Pugnamancy, Vitamancy, and Necromancy. I will describe each in turn. Note that a wizard does not need to stick to one category, and learn just Pugnamantic spells. The wizards could learn some Telemancy and Pugnamancy as he/she wishes

Domestimancy is household magic. Under it involves spells to cook food, remove dirt, and other stuff like that. Its also has the everyday magics, like firework-like effects, lights, and all of that sort. It also tends to have all of the magics that wizards couldn't put in another category, or make another category for.

Telemancy is the summoning spells. It allows the wizard to summon creatures from the beyond (like demons, angels, imps, etc.), as well as all the teleportation magics.

Pugnamancy is fighting spells. Fireballs, lightning bolts, etc. Whatever gaming system you play is probably full of them.

Vitamancy is the life magics. It has healing magics, as well as spells that positively effect living things. With the correct Vitamancy spell, you could make a farmer's harvest more bountiful, as well as remove diseases and such. It also has a darker side- it can create plagues, and encourage existing plagues, as long as the plague itself is bacterial.

Necromancy is death magic. Its been outlawed by all of the Atheian human countries, and is heavily looked down upon by the barbarians. Though Necromancy includes the making of zombies and liches and wraiths and ghosts and such, it also includes any of the other spells that involves death, such as a Speak with Dead and resurrection.

You may have noticed that none of these magics allow for the changing of one thing into another. None of these categories has a spell for changing lead into gold. Or something of that ilk. What can transform two objects is alchemy. Creating a potion or compound or such can change something into another things. There are two main problems with this, however. The first is that such changes don't last forever. The length of change depends on the volume of the alchemical substance applied. And the second is that not all conversions have been discovered.

But before we launch right into the topic, let's hit the history books, and write up cavalry history.

First there were chariots. Back in the day, way before the Year of the Exile, the invention of the chariot (and the innovations that accompanied it, such as spinning death-blades on the wheels) was a big thing in military history. It was used to great effect on the plains of Atheus, and the myriad of city-states strewn throughout the continent. But then the phalanx emerged from the western hills (courtesy of the goblins) and the chariots was swept aside.

Cavalry then moved from a rickety box on wheels behind the horse to a place on top. The services of cavalry changed, too. They went from the front line sweep to such duties as scouting the enemy, raiding stationary targets, pursuing fleeing foes. Such duties were thought best done out of the chariot. And then, once the world got used to this diminished role of cavalry, infantry tactics transitioned from anti-cavalry to anti-infantry. After all, everyone's cavalry is all ready weak. Why pay men trained to fight a foe that won't attack?

This brings us to the World War. At the beginning, all of the fighting was infantry against infantry. The commanders of Tauria and Obstaria watched this fighting, however, and thought to themselves about how best to exploit this to their own advantage. They knew that they were probably going to be dragged into the conflict somehow, no matter how aloof their kings were acting. They decided on the knight.

Unlike the cavalry of the past, the knight was a heavy cavalry. The other cavalry was light, with light armors and supplies that aided long-distance and sprints- the type of things they were designed for. The knight wore heavy armor, had heavy equipment, and didn't give a s*** about what the horse felt about all this weight on its back.

When Tauria and Obstaria did, in fact, join the war, the unleashing of their knights was a shock to the rest of the world. The first knights charging into battle, pompously blocking a sword swing with their shield was jarring. Shields on a horse? Unheard of. But they were successful. Charging directly into combat with a line of lances, which decimated the opposition, and then finishing what was left with their swords, was an entirely new tactic, which the troops were unprepared for. Which, along with the other innovations of the two countries (such as the Raveten), left the world reeling.

After the war was finished, the world stared. And produced their own knight corps. And infantry forces trained to be effective against both knights and infantry.

Today's knight corps are formed from the nobles of each kingdom. As the horse and equipment is very expensive, a knight is required to provide its own. Nobles and rich men do join, however, especially in Atheus's current lull in hostilities. They join to get glory, to get woman, but mostly because its expected of them. Its almost a sign of masculinity, of affirming that they can do something. A common career path for younger noble sons who arean't going to inherit is advancement through the knights.

In the early days of spells, when the elves, dwarves, and humans started inventing them, casting spells were tricky. No one really knew what they were doing, they were simply acting, which meant that there were redundancies and contradictions and all sorts of things making even the simplest of spells complex and difficult. Which led to the invention of wands.

The wand is an object (any object, though the short, straight rod is the most common) that has been imbued with a spell. All that the wizard needs to do is activate the spell. Once that spell has been cast, the wand cannot be used to cast the spell again. To counter this fallacy, the inventors of the wand found a way to put multiple charges inside the wand, though the charges have to be all of the same spell. For example, you can't put a charge of a Fireball in, and then throw in a Lightning Bolt. You could, however, put in two or three Fireballs into that wand.

Another limitation is the material that the wand is made out of. A wand has a special carrying capacity for spells, and going over that capacity causes all of the magic to burst from its confines. This first burst is usually harmless- they were spells, and ordered, and tend to simply leak back into the background magic. What happens next is an implosion. The background magic rolls back into the wand, causing a high magic density and pressure, which results in an explosion of magic. The wand will either explode, shatter, turn to dust/ash/dirt, or in some other way be destroyed, while 1-4 sorcerous effects will take place. Normally, these effects are violent and harmful, though there is a chance- albeit slim- for helpful or neutral effects. Tentacles, 100 cubic meters of water, wand turning into acid, spikes rocketing from various nearby surfaces, and more have all been documented.

Naturally, most wizards don't put a lot of spells into their wands. Or carry multiple wands.

With these two limitations, why are wands used? For two reasons. The first is if you do mess up you spell, or it "fizzles," as the wizards call it. Then, there's a chance that a random, usually completely unrelated to the spell, sorcery will occurr. These fizzles usually occur in combat, when its in the enemies' interest to make you fizzle, or in other tense situations (assassinating the king, cheating at poker, etc.). Wands are useful since no concentration is required. You give it a little magical encouragement, and poof, the spell is cast.

The second is for convenience. The wizard might have a very busy morning, and a certain spell helps them go through it faster, and they have plenty of time to prepare the wand at nights. Or when you're repeatedly called upon to do the same spell repeatedly, like a Divination at a war council, or a Fireball when defending a castle (where the enemy can't make you fizzle).

The creation of the wand is very simple. First, you must take the object that you want to turn into a wand. Second, you cast a spell on it. And thus, you have a wand, and can now proceed to fill it with spells. This wand-making spell takes some experience to learn and be able to use, but not much (in game terms, make it a level two to level five spell, depending on your game system- it should be an easy spell, and quick to learn, but not immediate).

My previous post discussed wands. This next will discuss their upgrade: the Shaman Staff. In the barbarian tribes, a common feature is the shaman. The shamans are the wizards of the barbarians, and bear a special title mainly because humanity bestowed it upon them to make the other races seem inferior to them.

Though it may be true that as humanity's numbers and information storage potential have allowed them to invent and remember more spells than the barbarians and (more specifically) the shamans can, the shamans do have one advantage over the humans (or more advantages, I'm not sure yet): their staves.

Humans have not found out how to store different spells in the same device. Shamans have. They have found how to enchant a staff so as to be a conduit for the magics contained in objects attached the staff. The one requirement for this is that the objects attached have to be alive at some point. Which is why Shamans typically use bird feathers, as they are less likely to rot. Besides, they look nice.

There is two main disadvantage to the Shaman's Staff. And that is that once-living objects used in either the Staff or wand making are unreliable. They are able to hold less magical charges in general, compared to non-living objects. Of course, this is easily overcome by having extra feathers.

The second disadvantage is that the taking off of the once-living spell-holding, once spells have been stored inside of it, tends to cause... adverse side effects. Depending on the amount of spells stored in the object, the resulting explosion increases in size, from taking off the plucker's hand to killing everyone in a hundred-foot radius.

Still, the benefits outweigh the disadvantages, and if the humans deigned to consort with the barbarians, or, in the case with kingdoms other than Tauria and Obstaria, were given permission too, they would immeadiately try to get the Shaman's to reveal their secrets.

Perhaps it is rash of me to say this, put I would like a freetext for my current world of Atheus. As I currently have 14 subs, not including the base sub of Atheus, I feel that it is time to organize them in a more lasting way, and I am tired of linking them to Atheus. Besides, I'm considering (well, more like all ready decided to) turning Atheus into one of those weird Region things, and I need a couple more submissions from what http://strolen.com/guild/index.php/topic,4965.0.html says.

I don't know the general protocol for getting freetexts, but I do know that I am not done with Atheus, and can see many more subs to be added in the future. After all, I haven't even touched the various organizations or city capitols. I don't think I've named a capitol either. And what about the Merthia question? Since it's completely wrecked and is pretty much bandit country (what? Did I not mention that?), and that Obstaria is probably going to be a land with nobles being the ones with any real power, and not the king, there is considerable more to say of Atheus. You haven't seen the last of the place.

So, uh, can I have an Atheus freetext? Please? Pretty please with sugar on top? Pretty please with and ?

You can just make a freetext? Huh. I never knew that. I always thought you needed to be an admin or be at some level that was higher than my own. Well, thanks. I guess you do learn something new every day.

This will doubtlessly be expanded into a full fledged submission, which I plan to do eventually for each of the kingdoms of Atheus (okay, fine, we can downgrade that doubtlessly to hopefully), but as I recently wrote up The Burning Cult and the plot Seeking Vengeance; Adventurers Needed, I felt that perhaps a quick explanation would perhaps be helpful.

In the course of the World War, the fighting happened in Merthia. Sure, there were other locales, but Merthia was where most of the combat took place. This was mostly because of its location. Though it had been previously made fat on trade routes, this center location turned Merthia into a desolate wasteland. Farms were ravaged and burned to feed armies, and cities were conquered and re-claimed and then conquered again by Obstaria or Tauria. And then, for two years Obstaria and Tauria held it, defended it, and treated it like crap. To finish off the problem, when the World War was over, and it came time for War Debts and War Reparations to be paid, instead of actively sending in their militaries or physical aid, the other countries (with Tauria being the biggest contributor for this, as they were the only ones to actually put a decent effort into paying- the rest of the world still owes Tauria and Obstaria) simply threw money at the problem. This only increased two things in Merthia: banditry and corruption.

"Evil" runs rampant in Merthia. Evil is in quotes because I don't believe it, and thus such things as "good" and "evil" don't exist truly in Atheus (sure, people can believe they exist, like people believe the moon is a ever-changing series of gods if they're Lunist). This evil takes the form of bandits and professional armies. The first of these is bandit tribes running around and raiding towns. As the details of this are obvious, let us move on to the next: professional armies. Merthia does not have the American third amendment. Soldiers can quarter themselves in people's homes, and can make use of a town's food supply. In other words, legal raiding. Through threatening violence, armies take all of a town's stored food while in the field pursuing a particularly dangerous tribe of bandits. If this happens in the spring or summer, the consequences are not as severe. But if it happens after harvest, then it consigns numerous families to starving to death during the winter unless they can somehow hunt for enough food to survive. Indeed, armies are even worse than bandits, as bandits are usually smaller, and need less food (and both take what they need to survive- no sense in destroying an entire town, as you can't tax or raid them next year if they're dead).

Why don't people rebel? No one has tried, mainly because of disjointed attempts of self-protection. Some towns tried to make walls and other defenses, and try to keep armies and bandits from taking their food supplies. The government thought they were rebelling. The government reacted with violence. An army equipped with siege weapons was sent to make an example of the town. The term "overkill" is best used to describe what was done. The warning was received by the Merthians.